Kassandora pointed with a stick at the board behihese men had made the Binturong, they had made the Raptor, the Lemur, the Lynx and the multitude of rifle models that ed. It was ohing to steer a ship along with the wind, it was ao try and wrestle with it every step of the way. Kassandora would have not achieved half the success she managed if she did not know how to go with the flow.

  So the Goddess of War smiled at the engineers as she dropped the series of projects onto the table. Two models of helicopter, a heavy bomber, a fighter, something lighter than the Lynx, a handheld mortar, a quick jeep, a troop carrier, one for mass produ and one armed with a small turret. Anti-aircraft guns, both mobile and stationary, and missiles.

  She did not care what order they would be done. Ohe invasion from the o actually came, she could start reag then. But for now, all she could do was just get as far ahead as possible.

  “It’s done.” Anassa said as she finished crafting a golden ring. Personally, she hated any sort of work this precise. It was easy to mess up, and a single mistake would send her back to the start. She had taken a small heartstone gem and wound it tightly into the gold, to make a thick ring. It worked uhe same principle that Essa’s tai crystals did, but naturally better. Better because Anassa made them.

  “Took you long enough.” Fer said idly. She had been tasked with helping Anassa watch over Essa as the Goddess of Sorcery manufactured a ring strong enough to keep the woman in check. The magical array in the Divine Library had been old teology. Once Kassandora had expined what a tai crystal was, it was undoubtedly better. And onassa worked out the details, she didn’t o know the nitty gritty details of it. It would work because she willed it to work.

  “Could you have made it?” Anassa asked.

  “I’d have eaten the limbs ahe wounds. Then have two guards cut off the nubs whehey start re-growing.” Fer said, her head resting oable as her goldeared at Essa. The Goddess of Magit pale with the words. “I wasn’t threatening, don’t worry E.” Fer said.

  “That’s worse.” Essa mao whisper out. Anassa saw Fer smile in satisfa to herself as she brought over the finished ring. As always, magic worked out the principal, sorcery mastered the work. “What’s that?” Essa asked as Anassa put the ring down oable. They were in CR. Essa wasn’t around close to Nanbasa, and no one wao leave sleeping Baalka without a supervisor in case the Goddess did actually wake up. Fat ce of that though, Anassa had tried, Kavaa had tried, even Arascus and Fer had tried. Even Neneria had tried to coax Baalka’s soul to awaken, but there had been nothing. Yet the woman’s heart was still beating, she was still breathing, so Anassa would let her sleep for a thousand years more if it meant she would wake up.

  “This is a tai crystal.” Anassa said ily. It basically was, simply an entment of draining on a hungry catalyst that stantly leaked its energies into the air. It wouldn’t work on someone like Fer, who was naturally strong, but on Essa? Who practically a living leyline would drain her quickly. “But in ring form, but it on.” Essa looked up at Anassa from her chair. She was in a dress of blue, ohat Helenna had so generously sewn for the Goddess of Magic at Arascus’ behest. Anassa herself was just wearing her jured clothes, and now that Fer was out of Nanbasa and that CR was almost empty, she was walking around in animal skins again.

  “That’s it?” Essa asked.

  “It will work.” Anassa said.

  “I’d rather you put it on.” Fer hurried Essa up. The woman was impatient today.

  “How do you know it will work?” Essa asked nervously as she prodded the ring with her fingernail. It moved lightly oable, as any other ring would.

  “Because I made it.” Anassa replied. “Now put it on.” Essa sighed. She looked up at Anassa, she down across the table at Fer. Of Beasthood’s two ears bounced as she nodded for Essa to hurry up. The Goddess of Magic sighed again, she picked up that ring of gold. With red veins as if it umping blood, and she slipped it on her finger.

  Anassa felt it immediately, the seeping magic p from Essa as if every pore in the woman’s skin had suddenly started to sweat her magical energies out. Of Sorcery took a deep breath in that small wooden room, it was one of the giant trees that made up tral Requisitions. The brown walls seemed to get richer in colour, Fer’s ears up stood up, her hair turned a richer shade of gold. And Essa swayed in her seat. Oo the left, oo the right. Forwards and backwards and forwards again. Anassa put her hand on the woman’s shoulder. There were maybe a dozen people on this world she did not like to see suffer, Essa was one of them.

  But she still o be imprisohat much was obvious. They had all se Alsaria’s new procmation. Anassa would be needed in the ing days, and she would not be able to fight a war if she had to stay by Essa every day. The ring was a temporary measure, it would have to be recharged every now and then. If Essa started fighting it, it would run out of power in just two weeks. Otherwise it should hold for two months. “Ahh…” Essa moaned, her throat trying to make some word.

  “She looks as if you’ve drugged her.” Fer said ftly. She looked at Essa with those golden eyes. Maybe in front of someone else, Fer would try and pull a face or feign aion. Not in front of Anassa though, yet even though they knew each other far too well for Fer to hide what she was feeling, Anassa still not could not read that woman’s face. Was it ? Fer was empathetic. But for Essa? Was it pity? Was it just ical approval? Anassa could not pce her finger on it.

  “She’s most likely feeling drugged right now.” Anassa said. That was how it usually went when energies were expelled so rapidly. That was the differeween Anassa’s ring and Essa’s crystals. Essa’s stopped energy from esg, Anassa’s stopped them from entering in the first pce. A far more total approapriso.

  Essa swayed as she felt herself fainting. What Divine had not felt themselves faint at least a dozen times? She leaned forwards to get the blood flowing bato her head. Terrible. Just dht terrible. She tried moving her hand to the ring, but her arms wouldn’t respond. Someone grabbed her shoulder. Fer looked at her, looked at Anassa and stood up.

  What they were saying, Essa had no clue about. Her body simultaneously felt as if it had all the weight in the world, yet was also weightless. She was sure she inning her arms about, yet she khey weren’t moving. She was cold, yet a sweat had burst out across her whole body. She had never felt more alive, yet she was sure this was what dyi like.

  “I take her.” Anassa said glumly from behihis was truly annoying. The ents, the argumentation, everything else, she could take. Yet when someone else touched Essa, it was the same as if a member of the White Paried to touch Arascus. It simply would not be. Essa was Anassa’s. Why was Fer the one who was carrying her back to her room?

  “It’s better when they hear a heartbeat.” Fer said. She held Essa close over her chest, her head nuzzling into the woman’s bosom.

  “What are you talking about?” Anassa barked from behind. She wasn’t even walking, only floating through the air as sorcery carried her.

  “You’ll carry her with sorcery.” Fer said. “And I am telling you, it’s better when they hear a heartbeat.”

  “Why?” Anassa had never heard of such a thing. Yes, for babies. But Essa wasn’t a newborn, she was older than Anassa. Maybe older than Fer, although no one really knew how old Fer was.

  “I don’t know.” Fer replied ftly. “It’s just how it is.” Anassa scowled and rolled her eyes from behind. There was no point arguing and besides, Fer was the people person amongst them. What cim to fame did Anassa have about pying with hearts? “Are these free?”

  “Put her o…” Anassa remembered Essa did not know who they had sleeping in this tree. “Well, you know who.”

  “I do.” Fer said, she stopped o Baalka’s door, awkwardly moved to open the door as she still held Essa. Anassa snapped her finger and the door opeself, at least this way she could pretend she was useful. Fer stepped in, crossed the entire room in three long steps aly rolled Essa onto the bed. “Isn’t that adorable?” Who was she even asking? Was the smile for herself, or directed at Essa? Ana k wouldn’t be for her at least.

  Fer leaned dout the back of her hand onto Essa’s forehead. “She’s hot.”

  “It will pass.” Anassa said. It always did with these things, they were never pleasant. Anassa’s eyes bulged as Fer sat Essa straight and pulled the woman’s dress up and over her head. The moment, Essa was rolled up into covers and Fer purred from above. “You don’t have to strip her.”

  “Better she sweat into the bed than her clothes.” Fer said and poio Essa’s shoes. “You do those.”

  “Why me?” Anassa asked.

  “Stinky.” Fer replied. Anassa rolled her eyes, snapped her fingers, sighed, and listened as the pair of boots shot off Essa’s feet and onto the floor. “And the socks too.” Fer added. Anassa snapped her fingers again and the socks thumped into the wall, then bounced down onto the floor. “There we go.” Fer said as she rolled Essa onto the side, head on the pillow, one arm forwards, the other supp the head. One leg forwards too, to stop the Goddess from rolling onto her back.

  “Do you find that fun?” Anassa asked incredulously. This was a farce! Essa would be up by the end of the day, once her energies drained, she’d stop feeling as if she was dying.

  “I do!” Fer said. Anassa merely turned as Fer spun to fetch a bowl. That she pced at the foot of the bed. Then she brought a bottle of water, cracked it open, and held it to Essa’s lips. “Drink E. Drink.”

  “Mmmhhh….” Essa made some unintelligible sound.

  “Are you serious?” Anassa asked.

  “When you and Kassie fight, who takes care of you?” Fer said. Anassa blinked. It was Fer. Every siime. She sat there, on Essa’s bed, stunned. How could she even reply to that? Anyone who wasn’t one of Anassa’s sisters, Anassa would scoff at for this behaviour. It was merely pying o try a someoo debt. But Fer? Fer had no magily raw strength and speed, and she could rival Anassa in power. Why would Fer, of all people, ever a such a way?

  “This is fun?” Anassa asked ftly. She watched Fer rub Essa’s head and mouth drinking water. Essa drank some. “You’re serious?”

  “Nene bakes. Olephia paints. I ’t do this?” Fer said in a happy tone as Essa drank a quarter of the bottle. “I think she’s going to be sick.”

  “She’ll be sick a few times. It depends on how much power leaves her.” Anassa said. She had gohrough the same thing after all, several times, it was good endurand regeion training. “Archmages may throw up once, but Divines?” Anassa rolled her head from side to side. Essa would be throwing for the hour, if not two.

  Fer quickly grabbed Essa’s shoulders, rolled her onto her front, and pulled forwards over the edge of the bed. In the moment, Essa emptied her stomato the pink bowl on the floor. “Are we feelier?” Fer asked it in the same way she’d ask a child. Essa looked up at her, looked down at the bowl, and coughed. “More water. Drink. You’ll throw it up, but better than coughing your stomach out.”

  And Anassa watched. Maybe she had never seen this, because whenever Fer was like this, Anassa was in Essa’s position. She didn’t know what it was. Annoyano, not annoyahere was nothing annoying about it. Even if Essa was a White Pantheon member, she was still a prisoner. Fer would treat Alsaria this way if she was given the opportunity. It was that simple. She would treat everyohis way, but she was treating Essa this way right now. Essa, and not her… Anassa caught herself. What a child. Was she really jealous because this girl was getting doted on? It was just eai for Fer, in the same way that little girl pyed with dolls, Fer pyed with the needy. It was nothing to worry about whatsoever.

  Fer made Essa drink more water, which Essa threw up, to which she drank more, until she stopped throwing up. It was as simply as that. Fer used a small cloth to wipe her mouth, and thely pushed her deeper into the bed. “Don’t throw up there. Alright E?”

  “Mmhh-hhhmmm.” Essa firmed from the pillow. She had curled up into a bowl, only the top of her head visible. Two blue eyes looked through messy dark hair at Fer, at Anassa, and back again.

  “You’re sweating.” Fer said. Essa nodded and pulled the bedsheets tighter around herself.

  “Cold.” She whimpered.

  “It will be fine once you run out entirely and stabilize.” Anassa said again. It really was that simple. Essa moaned, her hands appeared from uhe covers, her firied to fiddle with the ring. Anassa merely watched, she herself had never been tained by a tai crystal, but Kassie had. And Kassie knew all too well what it felt like. Essa’s hands moved, her fingers closed around the ring, and theopped. The shiver, the woman strained, she burped, and Fer quickly grabbed her to pull her over the edge of the bed.

  And all the water she had dra her again. “Here, some more.” Fer said. Essa drank greedily, and she looked at her finger. She tried toug the ring with her other hand. It would ost of the distance, and then her hand would simply stop, uo press on any further.

  “Mine are different.” Essa said weakly.

  “Are they?” Anassa asked.

  “Mine, you ’t move towards it if you the iion of moving it. Yours is almost like a challenge.”

  “You’re wele to read it as that, it’s a challenge of sorcery.” Anassa smiled, there was no one on this world who would beat her in that.

  “Ah…” Essa said as Fer passed her another bottle of water. “Thank you.”

  “Don’t mention it.” Fer said as she patted Essa’s head. “We’ll stay here until we’re recalled, alright?”

  “Thank you.” Essa said, Anassa saw the woman finally smile, and she smiled herself.

  Essa did not know what it was. Maybe she had imagined Fer would be worse? Maybe it was the illness of her magic being drained? Maybe it was that now, she had a stant reminder of the fact she risoner on her finger? But whatever it was, she really did have to admit ohing.

  How Fer was treating her right now, no one had ever done.